OpenAI has announced its largest acquisition to date, acquiring legendary designer Jony Ive’s AI hardware startup io for $6.4 billion in an all-equity deal. The move marks a major step into the hardware space for OpenAI, which has until now been best known for its software-based AI models like ChatGPT.

Ive, Apple’s former chief design officer and the creative mind behind iconic products like the iPhone and iMac, will assume “deep creative and design responsibilities” at both OpenAI and io. While io will be brought in-house, Ive’s design firm LoveFrom will remain independent.

Founded just a year ago by Ive and fellow Apple alumni Scott Cannon, Tang Tan, and Evans Hankey, io has been focused on building consumer AI products. In a joint blog post, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Ive said the io team will now work closely with OpenAI’s product and engineering groups in San Francisco.

OpenAI already owned 23% of io before the deal and is paying roughly $5 billion for the remainder. Altman called Ive “the greatest designer in the world” in a post on X.